Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., left, accompanied by Rep. Jared Polis, D-Colo., speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Nov, 13, 2014, to discuss marijuana laws. The legislators came together again Wednesday to discuss the issue in the wake of the riots in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Lauren Victoria Burke)

WASHINGTON — Multiple members of Congress suggested Wednesday that the misguided policies of the drug war have played a central role in brewing tensions between police and residents in Baltimore that exploded into chaos after the death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray, according to Huffington Post.

At a press conference for a new bill that would ensure legal marijuana businesses have access to the banking system, the lawmakers advocated for changes to the nation’s drug policies. Reforms would start to address the racial disparities in law enforcement and mass incarceration that the decades-long war on drugs has produced in the U.S., they said.

“Right now when you see all of this disturbance in our inner cities, a lot of that has to do with frustration that’s been a problem when police end up doing what — having to search people to see if they can find some joint in their pocket, a little piece of weed, in order to ruin their life and put them in jail,” said Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.). “That doesn’t happen a lot in Orange County, but I know it happens in the inner city.”

There is approximately one marijuana arrest every minute in the U.S., according to the most recent FBI crime data. And while marijuana arrests are down overall, nearly 700,000 people were arrested for marijuana possession in 2013 — a figure totaling about half of all drug arrests in the nation. Despite similar rates of marijuana use, blacks and Latinos are four times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than whites nationwide, according to a recent American Civil Liberties Union study. In some parts of the country, blacks are seven or eight times more likely to be arrested for simple possession.

Gray suffered a spinal cord injury in police custody and died after slipping into a coma, setting off protests and riots in Baltimore. Officials said he ran from police, who then chased him and put him under arrest for carrying a switchblade knife. Gray’s arrest record shows that he had frequent encounters with police and multiple charges of possession or intent to distribute unspecified drugs, as well as possession of marijuana.